and reeking of scotch, I kick her.
5
----
Recently divorced 40-year-old man seeks a nice young woman to share roomy UES 2 bd. The room is large. Iâm a nice guy, easy to live with. Give me a chance! What have you got to lose? My nameâs Stanley.
----
Over the weekend, psyched about beginning my research in earnest, I send Alicia off to brunch and plant myself at my desk, which is tucked into a little nook of my living room with a window to my right. I live on a quiet block, but it is one of the first warm days of the year and Iâm easily distracted by kids playing in the garden I can see below and pigeonsâ springtime mating coos. I force myself to stay glued to my chairâexcept for one break when I allow myself to paint my new coffee tableâand spend the day scouring Craigâs List.
My only experience with computer dating was a quick trip through one of the more popular sites after a friend of a friend went out with an average of two guys a day for six months and eventually met her husband. I figured what the hell, bookmarked a few cuties, and developed a crush on a guy named BabarBoy from Brooklyn. As big a crush as you can develop for a flattering headshot and a series of pithy yet sincere answers to some banal questions. The second time I checked the site, BabarBoy had mysteriously vanished from that particular cyberzone. I figured thatâs the kind of luck I have with online dating and never went back. When everyone was first in their Friendster and then MySpace phase, I went out on five disastrous dates with guys who had seemed perfectly normal in their profiles, and carried on a passionate six-week correspondence with a writer on a retreat in Locarno. I was in a frenzy over possibly meeting The Guy until he returned to New York and we had coffee, and I learned he had bad skin, bad table manners, and no personality off the page. I was so embarrassed by the whole affair, I ran home and deleted every word of our gushing cyber-romance.
Looking for love in the real estate section, though, makes me feel the way big-time computer daters must feel: like the possibilities are endless if only you put in the time and chalk up the numbers. I have the funny impression of shopping for a boyfriend, feeling these men out the way you might finger plums at a farm stand: metaphorically admiring their purple sheen, squeezing them to test their firmness, sniffing for sweetness, eventually buying and taking a biteâor not. I decide I should have rules of conduct, so I write them down, excited to put words on a page.
Rule #1: During the initial phone conversation with a potential âroommate,â tell him immediately that Iâm not necessarily looking for an apartment. Iâm just seeing whatâs out there, because my current living situation is precarious and I might have to move fast. Nothing is definiteâyet. This provides an escape route since clearly Iâm not really moving in with the guy. Clever Courtney did this during her test calls the other night, and it worked remarkably well, leaving no one feeling dumped or duped.
The biggest hurdle with this whole project is my complete inability to tell a lie. I donât know if itâs a belief in the beauty of truth or fear of being caught, but regardless, anything more than a little white lie (âMy breakup with Jake was mutualâ; âIâll be there in thirty seconds, just walking out the doorâ; âIâm almost done with my Matt Dillon piece, Steve, just doing final tweaksâ) sets my voice wavering, my cheeks burning in shame. I realize pretty quickly that this scheme will require me to overcome this phobia. I have to pretend Iâm not sitting in a beautiful new apartment in the East Village chatting on the brand-new portable phone I just plugged into my brand-new, flawlessly painted eggshell-white wall, but that I really want to move into the spare room in some guyâs charming duplex in
5
----
Recently divorced 40-year-old man seeks a nice young woman to share roomy UES 2 bd. The room is large. Iâm a nice guy, easy to live with. Give me a chance! What have you got to lose? My nameâs Stanley.
----
Over the weekend, psyched about beginning my research in earnest, I send Alicia off to brunch and plant myself at my desk, which is tucked into a little nook of my living room with a window to my right. I live on a quiet block, but it is one of the first warm days of the year and Iâm easily distracted by kids playing in the garden I can see below and pigeonsâ springtime mating coos. I force myself to stay glued to my chairâexcept for one break when I allow myself to paint my new coffee tableâand spend the day scouring Craigâs List.
My only experience with computer dating was a quick trip through one of the more popular sites after a friend of a friend went out with an average of two guys a day for six months and eventually met her husband. I figured what the hell, bookmarked a few cuties, and developed a crush on a guy named BabarBoy from Brooklyn. As big a crush as you can develop for a flattering headshot and a series of pithy yet sincere answers to some banal questions. The second time I checked the site, BabarBoy had mysteriously vanished from that particular cyberzone. I figured thatâs the kind of luck I have with online dating and never went back. When everyone was first in their Friendster and then MySpace phase, I went out on five disastrous dates with guys who had seemed perfectly normal in their profiles, and carried on a passionate six-week correspondence with a writer on a retreat in Locarno. I was in a frenzy over possibly meeting The Guy until he returned to New York and we had coffee, and I learned he had bad skin, bad table manners, and no personality off the page. I was so embarrassed by the whole affair, I ran home and deleted every word of our gushing cyber-romance.
Looking for love in the real estate section, though, makes me feel the way big-time computer daters must feel: like the possibilities are endless if only you put in the time and chalk up the numbers. I have the funny impression of shopping for a boyfriend, feeling these men out the way you might finger plums at a farm stand: metaphorically admiring their purple sheen, squeezing them to test their firmness, sniffing for sweetness, eventually buying and taking a biteâor not. I decide I should have rules of conduct, so I write them down, excited to put words on a page.
Rule #1: During the initial phone conversation with a potential âroommate,â tell him immediately that Iâm not necessarily looking for an apartment. Iâm just seeing whatâs out there, because my current living situation is precarious and I might have to move fast. Nothing is definiteâyet. This provides an escape route since clearly Iâm not really moving in with the guy. Clever Courtney did this during her test calls the other night, and it worked remarkably well, leaving no one feeling dumped or duped.
The biggest hurdle with this whole project is my complete inability to tell a lie. I donât know if itâs a belief in the beauty of truth or fear of being caught, but regardless, anything more than a little white lie (âMy breakup with Jake was mutualâ; âIâll be there in thirty seconds, just walking out the doorâ; âIâm almost done with my Matt Dillon piece, Steve, just doing final tweaksâ) sets my voice wavering, my cheeks burning in shame. I realize pretty quickly that this scheme will require me to overcome this phobia. I have to pretend Iâm not sitting in a beautiful new apartment in the East Village chatting on the brand-new portable phone I just plugged into my brand-new, flawlessly painted eggshell-white wall, but that I really want to move into the spare room in some guyâs charming duplex in
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